


A Refuge of Arctic Snow

by jamingbenn



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Sleepy Boys Inc (Video Blogging RPF), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst and Feels, Family Dynamics, Fix-It, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Team as Family, and finds a home in phil and wilbur and more, i have no idea how to tag this, i'll add more character tags as they come into play, listen techno goes out into the cold, no beta we die like wilbur revives, sbi as found family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:00:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27874969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jamingbenn/pseuds/jamingbenn
Summary: The hunger for blood had to cease, eventually.There had to be something else that made him human. Not life, for Wilbur's face was grey, and yet he still stood. Nor violence, for after all that Techno had incited, he still felt wooden inside.Whatever it was. He hopes he'll find it in the cold.Or, after the events of the L'Manburg Finale, Techno retreats to the Arctic wilderness alone. Or so he thinks. A DreamSMP Arctic AU focusing on the SBI.
Relationships: Dave | Technoblade & Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Dave | Technoblade & Wilbur Soot, Dave | Technoblade & Wilbur Soot & Phil Watson
Comments: 4
Kudos: 92





	A Refuge of Arctic Snow

**Author's Note:**

> yeah, sorry, bloodlust!techno and also recovering-from-bloodlust!techno won't leave me alone.
> 
> also, this is techno-centric, but focuses heavily and exclusively on the dynamics between phil, techno, and wilbur. (and yknow. shh)
> 
> somewhat dreamsmp canon compliant as of early december, but also, caveat: i pretty much only regularly watch phil and techno. any discrepancies hence apply.

The wind was biting. 

Fuck. It was hard to think of anything but the cold, this far up north. Hard to clear his mind of the seeping numbness creeping in to his very core. It claimed his extremities first, chilled fingertips helpless but to tremble. It’ll be his rationality that goes next. Techno’s teeth grit, hard, feeling the pressure of the unforgiving grind. Focusing on flutter of his eyelashes against his cheeks, each blink a little spike of frosted snow against still warm skin. 

Not much longer now, he thought grimly, the idea grating against his pride. Not much longer now.

—

There was a figure in the howling wind.

His yellow jumper was blurred by the swirling snow, wet air misting up in the harsh climate, but the colour stood out stark on these barren lands. A bright flash of warmth, even if only for the eyes. Something alive.

His face was grey, but it was fine. He knew him, but it was not like he could help. No, whatever glory days Wilbur had, they were long gone. Not quite a king, even when he wanted to rule like one.

His footsteps crunched closer.

There is nothing here for you, Techno thought bitterly. You asked for me too early, and now it is too late. Go.

His eyes close against the cold.

—

“Techno. Put the blade down.”

He didn’t know if he could. His bones were frozen in shape, aching something deep, tightly wrapped as they were against the cold metal handle of his sword. An old weapon, out of fashion now, but he could not let it go. Oh, sure, he was proficient with an axe, one of the best there was, but this sword. Something told him he had to hold on, and it wasn’t just the cold forcing his joints into immobility.

He opened his eyes.

“Hello, Wilbur.”

Wilbur’s face was grey. A new development that Techno did not anticipate. But despite the foreignness of his colour, the contours of his face were the same. Unwittingly, something warm ran though him.

“It’s nice to see a familiar face.”

—

Wilbur laughed, laden heavy with emotion that Techno had naught the privilege to unpack. “I would say the same,” he starts, stripping off the thick gloves warming his skin, “but your ugly mug barely qualifies.”

Wilbur reached out, wrapping his fingers, flush from the warm wool of his gloves, around Techno’s own, stiff from the cold. “Hush, now. The weapon can be sheathed.”

Techno’s eyes closed once more. “The weapon can never be sheathed,” he whispered. “Somehow, someone always finds a use.”

Wilbur smiled. “But not now.” The heat of his hands was finally transferring to Techno’s own. “You can rest now, Teddy. Even if just for a while.”

Wilbur’s hands were clumsy around the handle. He was never much of a fighter, despite Techno’s best efforts, but he raised the blade steadily enough at the awkward angle needed for it to be sheathed.

It slid back into the buttery fabric, the first time in a long time, the quiet sound of coming home.

—

They walked. Where to? Wilbur scarcely knew, and didn’t much care to ask. He had faith that Techno knew, despite the man being weaker than he’d ever known.

Each step seemed like a battle for Techno, war-worn as he was. Still, they trudged steadily north.

—

Techno was familiar with the cold. It was something he had always known, born in the depths of the South, his father’s Antarctic empire rising in might around him. Steady as his right hand man.

His bones ache with the weight of the history he has lived through. The history he caused. But as always. Human greed leads to human lost. Those are stories of the old, now.

Now they walk.

—

There wasn’t something that Techno was looking for, except something in him knew, the same thing that had always beaconed him north. Once, that meant to the warmer climates, pulling him from the familiar South mansions of the Antarctic to both people and lands yet unknown to him then.

He knew them now. Intimately so. L’manburg, Wilbur’s unfinished symphony.

—

When night fell, he saw it. A crowd of trees, spruce and pine, surrounding a tiny clearing of grass. A dot of green on this barren white landscape.

If he didn’t know any better, he would have called it a miracle.

—

Wilbur has changed. His footsteps still sounded heavily in the snow, his voice still rang with melodic flourish, but when he waved, no shadow echoed. When he stood in front of Techno, the wind passed right through.

His face had no colour, even though he was still warm.

“Pretty unfair that the dead man’s the one with the hat,” Techno said.

“Not dead,” Wilbur smiled. “And I’d give you my beanie if I could.”

“Keep it,” Techno groaned, hoisting the satchel he was keeping close to his torso onto the fork of a tree. “We’re here anyways.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

—

Welcome to the Arctic, a refuge they'll call home.

**Author's Note:**

> yeah sorry i had this in my drafts for a MONTH and then techno had to fucking go and stream him literally building a home with phil. ok. i'm fine. i'm fine. also i don't trust those bastards not to wage an imperialistic war and establish an empire at ALL so while this is plotted out to be a warm, nice, not-very-plotty recovery found family fic, if they fucking go to bat against the rest that is certainly bound to inspire.
> 
> more character tags will be added as necessary.


End file.
